Finally a complete break with the past

When we left Christianity, we left our old, liberal, Episcopal church with very few feelings of disagreement.  One of the reasons it was so hard to leave...and took so long to let myself do it...was because of the people there and the fact that they had been so good to us.  That is why it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to read the newsletter and see how they trashed Zach at the Vestry meeting.

Months ago (maybe 4? 5?) we each sent in our letters of resignation for our various ministries. Mine was the Altar Guild and Zach's was the Vestry.  He also told Mary several times that he was resigning.  He had tried to resign last fall but she guilted him into staying.

So we got the newsletter today and the Vestry meeting stated that Zach only gave a verbal resignation and since he had missed so many meetings they had no choice but to "accept his verbal resignation" and put out word for someone to replace him.  I'm a bit cheesed as he told Mary several times that he was still getting notices of meetings.  This months after he sent her his written resignation, which she said she got.

The church was never perfect and we didn't expect it to be but one of the wonderful things about it was no one ever stabbed anyone in the back before.  Until now.  We did tend to overlook problems within the church, such as the congregation never seeming to want to do anything to bring anyone new in.  Except complain about it. 

On the other hand, this does confirm for me that we made the right choice in leaving.  A few people did reach out to us but we were loathe to respond because we didn't want to have to explain.  But it did seem that the efforts were half-hearted except on the part of the priest, but since she didn't exactly tell the Vestry the truth about Zach's resignation, I'm not feeling as charitable.  He, on the other hand, is a bit meh about it all.  He always knew leaving was the right choice for him and stayed as long as he did for me.  He wanted to leave a year ago.

I don't want to turn this into a rant against the church.  For the most part we had pleasant experiences there and it's not their fault we both lost the ability to believe in the tenets of Christianity.  They were nothing but nice to us, if a bit distant.  But this incident does end any regrets I might have had about leaving.  I haven't been thinking about going back but occasionally I did wonder if we made the right move.  I now know we did.

Miss Piggy didn't come to visit last night and we haven't seen Kermit and Bitty in several days.  I don't know if the cool nights have given them the instinct to move on or if they have served their purpose and it's time for us to learn the lessons and move on.  I do miss them though.

I've been reading Confessions of a Pagan Nun by Kate Horsley and I really like it so far. But other than that no reading so I need to get busy on that.  And my energy was way low today especially in light of only getting about 4 hours of sleep the past two nights thanks to Professor insisting on me getting up early.  He just won't take no for an answer and uses his indoor bark to get me up to let him out.  I'm hoping to get to sleep earlier tonight because I have much to do in the way of studying and arts and crafts and Druidry.

I found some patterns to crochet and knit for decorations for the Autumn Equinox and since I already have some of the yarn colors needed, I should get busy on them.  I could finally finish a project since I don't think I've done that all summer.

Off to eat homemade potato-leek soup and brussel sprouts and home-grown tomatoes.  Next year, the garden will be magnificent.